The Texico baseball team is going for a three-peat this postseason. The two-time defending state champs open up the postseason as the top seed in Class 3A.

“We were number one the last two seasons and we like it like that and evewrybody always tries to gun for us,” said senior Ben Crist. “But we always seem to come prepared and take advantage of their mistakes.”

But just because you’re number one, doesn’t guarantee you a title. A lot of these kids know that lesson too well.

“This particular group, most of them played basketball and played perfect until the very end so that’s in the back of their minds,” said head coach Ty Thatcher. “I think they hopefully learned from the mistakes that were made in the waning moments of basketball season to go ahead and finish this one out.”

“We played well every game except one quarter of basketball there at the end,” explained Dalton Thatcher. “We just gotta know that you gotta go till it’s over. You have to play hard through the whole thing and win.”

“You always learn from losses but you also learned from wins,” is the message Nathan Phipps took away from the championship basketball defeat. “It doesn’t sit in the back of my mind. It’s a new sport, a new season and you have to be hungry and want it.”

Their combined record over this past three-year stretch is now 73-and-9.

“They do have a confidence, they do have the competitive spirit that takes them a lot of places and will continue later in life,” said their head coach.

Texico will face Laguna Acoma in the quarterfinals Wednesday at 10am at Cleveland High School in Rio Rancho.